VII- Simon Williams: The Carnival of Masks

If Mark Wilkinson is most closely associated with MARILLION, Simon Williams is synonymous with the neo-progressive group, PENDRAGON. Its two most famous album covers – "The Masquerade Overture" and "Not Of This World" - are vast narrative frescos filled with animals or fairy-like characters referencing the fantastic universe of the group. Sumptuous on the artistic level, and including a masterful use of colours, these multi-coloured artworks are powerfully ingrained images of progressive art of the seventies.

"The Masquerade Overture" in particular is extremely well-conceived: its concentric composition accentuates chaos, while the irradiating light of a bright central sun becomes increasingly dark and worrying on the edges. With its masked characters, magicians, snakes, unicorns, angels and demons, this pictorial image is unquestionably alluring. Perfectly matched to the dimensions of the old 33 rpm discs, the image is less well adapted to the smaller CD format, in which it becomes difficult to appreciate all subtleties.

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